A blog about the Big Four of the English Premier League

NOW we get 3 points

What do you do when you’re faced with an absolutely dead rubber like Wolverhampton Wanderers traveling to the home of the Champions. You field the Wolverhampton Wanderers ‘B’ team, and make it all interesting, with people spinning of theories about how it could’ve been with their ‘A’ team (shuarely), and how this has now destroyed Birmingham’s title chances (hey you never know, 5 wins in a friggin row!). This thing with ‘B’ teams can be thrashed about all day long and not get anywhere. United has had a thing with wolfish teams and ‘B’ teams this season. Once we played our B team, and won. Now the other team played their B team, and we won again. The philosophy was beautifully explained by the great Indian mystic Simbu Maharishi – Life is a circle. In it, one who wins loses, and one who loses wins.

Last year, United played a weakened team at Hull in the final game of the season, with the title already won and Barca coming up in the Champions League finals. In the idealest of cases, United won (as expected?) and Hull still stayed up (cos everyone else around them fked up). But who knows if United had lost, and hence Hull had stayed up. As I said, these arguments can go on and on. If you’ve played a team in a competition, you have. End of story.

United were doing the whole wounded tiger thing. Wounded in an all-too-literal way too, defensively. Wees Brown got injured again, so Carrick had to slot back in. 60 minutes into the game and 2-0 up, Vidic jogged off, effectively nullifying the Wolves’ fans chants of ‘we want the first team’. Hey, so did we, but we’re getting by with what we have aren’t we! If nothing else, this crisis has given an excellent indicator of what we need to buy in the January transfer window – Center-Back, 1 piece of. Right -Back, 1 piece of. All said and done, O’Shea’s a utility player, Rafael’s a kid and Neville’s his granddad. So Right-back, 1 piece of, definitely. The third goal also duly arrived from a piece of Berbatovism. The definition of this is slightly involved though.

Brebatovism – noun. A piece of football skill only he can do, but mostly won’t do, and when he does everyone will wonder why he mostly won’t do, but that’s ok cos at the end of the day, sometimes, he does do.

As I said, it’s mildly involved. And so he collected the ball, flicked it up, kicked it over his shoulder and made sure it landed right in Valencia’s stride. Luis Antonio Valencia, the man who’s played the most minutes for United this season, duly ensured that the Berbatovism was not wasted. Cue Rooney getting subbed off (seriously, it’s the Wolves ‘B’ team!), cue Rooney being annoyed by the move (you’re a Dad now Wayne, more responsibilities!), and cue Michael running on to the pitch and sprinting into the final third with his arms raised, not getting the ball, and sprinting back.

Fulham next, and we’re still on ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space’ with our defence. Vidic and Brown are mostly out of that one too (Dear Lord!).Craven Cottage has already scalped Liverpool. Oh wait, that’s not something to mention as a credential anymore. But still, Fulham at home in their pre-Stone Age stadium are always a banana-peel fixture, and there’s no way we can do two losses in 7 days. In the interim, to keep people interested will be the Champions League draw on Friday. And all grudges and personal rivalries aside, I’ll be very fine with not getting Inter, AC and Bayern, thank you.